


Out of Nowhere

by traceylane



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, Slow Burn, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, and the other half are running a bookstore in a small desert town, au where half of them are making a movie, because soulmates are complicated, destiny ensues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-31
Updated: 2016-09-10
Packaged: 2018-08-12 03:10:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7918192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/traceylane/pseuds/traceylane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's June and Keith just wants to graduate.</p><p>Enter the cast and crew of <em>Space Dash 2: Takeoff</em>,  an upcoming blockbuster whose star has come into Keith's peaceful little desert town with the sole purpose of ruining his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Warning

_"We all want to break our orbits, float like a satellite gone wild in space, run the risk of disintegration. We all want to take our lives in our own hands and hurl them out among the stars."_

_\- David Bottoms_

\---

Keith usually liked closing the store; he liked to take his time turning off the lights, row by row, and walk through the stacks so he could flip to random pages in books he would probably never read all the way through. 

But that day he left a little before closing, wishing Allura and Coran a good night. 

"Have fun!" Coran called out from the History section. "Too bad you have to miss Reshelving Day." 

"We reshelve every day, Coran," Keith called back, reaching behind the counter for his longboard and his jacket.

"You're leaving? To get some sleep, I hope. You looked half dead when I came in this morning." Allura emerged from the back room, and then sighed when she saw him already speeding across the street. 

It was in the high 80's, pretty cool for this part of the country. Keith's hair whipped around his face as he raced down the sidewalk, passed the gas station, the library, the only grocery store in town. People waved at him as he came by, and he waved back. They were all neighbors, parents of classmates, owners of businesses he frequented on a weekly basis, and they knew him by name. Golion didn't have many tourists--the last big thing to happen there had been an alien sighting, but that had been a few years ago right before Allura and Coran moved into town (almost to the day), and the excitement had kind of died out. Although Keith still had the articles pinned up in his room, and the convenience store still sold UFO postcards. 

Keith was checking his watch when the town's movie theater came into view at the end of the avenue. It was on the other side of town from Alfor's Rare Books ("Largest Astronomy Collection This Side of the Galaxy!"), but he convinced himself he made good time.

Pidge didn’t look happy when he rode up to the front of the ticketing kiosk, and then looked unhappier still when he skated right past them, only stepping off his board when he was halfway through the entrance. "Come on, we're late." He smirked and looked back at Pidge. "You already got mine, right?"

Pidge glared at him and then follows him in. "I know we're late, you asshat, I told you to be here at 5:30--"

"The movie starts at 6:00."

"--because I knew you would be late!"

"So then what's the problem?"

"It's 6:05!" Pidge handed their tickets to the girl at the stand, who pointed them towards Auditorium 11.

"It's fine, there are previews." 

" _ You know I like watching the previews _ !"

They bickered until they entered the dark of the theater, and Pidge's annoyance evaporated into excitement when they find seats in the row third from the top.

"I've been waiting for this since I was in middle school."

"I heard the main guy dies," Keith whispered back.

"I heard  _ you're _ gonna die, if you don't shut up." 

The truth was that Keith wasn’t completely sure what they're seeing. He didn't really care; going to the movies was just one of the few things they could really  _ do _ in this town, and he enjoyed it, even the part where Pidge talked all the way through.

Then the burning sensation started in Keith's upper arm, while the booming music of another preview played and Pidge continued their rambling commentary.

"Oh, it's that guy from  _ Space Dash _ . I didn't know they were making this into a movie, it looks kind of dumb--Keith? Keith, are you okay?"

Keith dug his nails into his arm and bit his lip, trying not to cry out. He focused on the screen to distract himself from how much it hurt. 

The camera was closing in on an actor, standing in an elevator opening in slow motion, and Keith’s vision filled with his face, which somehow made his arm sting even more. Tall, tan, high cheekbones--pain. 

"Keith, what's wrong?”

He stood from his seat and started to move towards the aisle. "Stay here, Pidge, I just... I need to go." 

"But the movie's about to start--Keith!"

\--

Keith was waiting by Pidge's locker the next day at school, ready with an apology and some news that had kept him from sleeping the night before.

"What the  _ fuck _ , Keith?" He heard Pidge before he saw them. "First you're late, then you  _ ditch _ me--"

"Pidge, I'm sorry, except just for ditching you, not for being late, but shut up and look at this."

He held up his left arm for Pidge to see.

Pidge rolled their eyes. "We get it, Keith. You lift."

"What? No--look!"

He pointed at his skin, and Pidge gasped. "Holy shit, Keith! You're Marked!"

It was a thin line that started about halfway between Keith's shoulder and his elbow and curled up just above the start of his forearm, like a cane.

"Yeah. I didn't expect it to hurt like hell." Keith traced a finger over it like he had in front of the mirror the night before, over and over. 

"Holy shit," Pidge said again, putting their hands over their mouth. "You have a Counter!"

Keith sighed. "Everyone has a Counterpart, Pidge."

"Yeah, but now  _ you _ have one!"

"And what's  _ that _ supposed to mea--"

"I can't tell what it is. Is it a fish hook? A question mark?" Pidge tilted their head, trying to decipher Keith's Mark. "Wow, and it's blue..."

"A fish hook? You think I'm going to find some kind of fisher in the middle of the desert?"

"Well, I don't know, these things are supposed to be really abstract, right? So maybe they're not a  _ fisher _ , maybe they're a fish  _ person _ , oh my god maybe it's a mermaid, holy shit, Keith, your Counterpart is a  _ mermaid _ , how will they survive here, it's so dry--"

"Pidge, stop it. My Counter isn't a mermaid."

"Are you saying that because you know that for a fact, or because you don't want to believe?"

"Dammit, Pidge, I’m serious!”

Keith couldn’t wrap his head around it. It didn't happen often around here--the usual lack of new faces meant that most of them had to leave Golion to find their Counterparts.  He thought back to some weird statistic Coran had told him before about the town having more cacti than people within a thirty mile radius. This place was a social bubble. 

But Keith supposed it wasn’t really the rarity of the situation that worried him, but the fact that it was happening to him, of all people.

"Maybe... maybe it just means I'll find them when I leave at the end of the summer. The first stage only happens when you're  _ close _ to meeting your Counter, right? This is just a warning."

Pidge  _ hm _ ed. "I don't know... I don't think it would show up three months in advance. You're not planning on leaving town any time sooner than that, right?" 

Keith shook his head. 

"Then maybe Golion's getting visitors soon."

A loud chime rang through the school speakers, different from the usual bell, and they froze.  A voice crackled through the intercom, announcing an impromptu assembly in the gym. Keith and Pidge gave each other a look, and then moved with the crowd, quietly anticipating what could be coming next.

\--

\--

"Lance, put your phone away. They’re going to call for us any minute."

Lance looked up at Shiro from the rolling chair he was slumped on, sideways with his legs up on the arm, and shrugged. "Sorry, I get texty when it's too hot."

They were waiting in room 124D. It was a math classroom, they assumed, decorated with calculus pun posters and the digits of pi snaking across the walls.  

"That doesn't even make any sense," Shiro said, "Also the temperature is just fine in here, and that chair is for teachers."

"Well, then, I guess I'm a teacher. And a hot one, don't you think?" Lance winked.

"Shiro, what are we supposed to say when we're up there?" Hunk was pacing anxiously through the classroom, weaving in and out of the rows of desks. "Is this like some kind of interview? I didn't think we were doing that, yet, I've barely looked at the script--"

Shiro looked up at the ceiling and sighed.

Takashi Shirogane loved his cast, these two especially, though he’d never admit it. They listened to him well and worked hard to bring his visions to life to the best of their ability. They were creative and talented and as much as they denied it Shiro owed his present success to them--his last project with them had gotten him more job offers than he could even consider, much less say yes to. 

But they were also a couple of knuckleheaded kids that Shiro couldn't help but feel responsible for, particularly in situations like these.

"Hunk, it's not an interview, the producers just wanted us here so we could thank them for--Lance, don't stand on that--letting us use the school for filming, so--Lance, you  _ can't stand on that _ , you're going to fall--they might just have you introduce yourself, and-- _ Lance! Get down from there! _ "

Lance was standing with one foot on each arm of his chair, stretching his hands out for balance. "Shiro, when are you going to remember that I do my own stunts? I--whoa--" Lance wobbled and Shiro swore he could feel his soul exiting his body--

But then Lance hopped agilely onto the desk in front of him. "Just kidding! Ta-da!" 

For a moment Shiro wondered if they were all going to make it out of this room alive, and then there was a knock at the door. A short, middle-aged woman with her hair in a bun peeked into the room and offered to take them to the gymnasium, and they happily accepted. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this whole fic is getting a revamp! stay tuned.


	2. A Warm Welcome

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi y'all! just in case you don't read through my hella long notes at the end, i'm looking for someone to beta my work, so if you think you could spare the time to help me out (and it would really help me out), please let me know!

"He looks kind of nervous."

"That's so cute."

The gymnasium wasn’t too big, and especially in the moments where they transitioned between speakers, it was easy to hear the chattering of the entire student body. A few of them even had their phones out to take pictures. Hunk swallowed and tried not to look too affected by it all, and he was smiling tightly when Lance gave him a grin, a thumbs up, and a light push towards the podium. 

"Um, hello, everyone. My name's Hunk La Rosa, and I play Seido." 

Hunk wasn't keen on getting too much attention. He loved what he did and was proud of his work, and it wasn't like he didn't appreciate when he was acknowledged by the occasional fan out on the street, but the idolization, the distance from normalcy, all of that was for someone else--and that someone else came up behind him and took his place at the microphone.

"It's him, oh my God."

"Do you think we'll get to talk to him after this? I'm going to die."

Lance preened for his audience, and there was a noticeable increase in the room's energy. Hunk and Shiro exchange a tired but endeared look when it seemed he was about three seconds away from flexing and Shiro whispered, "Lance, just introduce yourself."

Lance stopped (mid-flex) and muttered, "Oh, right," before turning back to the audience.

"Hey," he said, voice low. Cool. "I'm Lance Osuna, and I play Crow." He smirked, and the crowd shrieked.

The burning started below his shoulder while his gaze swept over the student body, and his easy grin faded as the feeling became more and more pronounced. For what felt like forever, Lance stood open mouthed at the microphone, unable to move, though he wasn’t not sure if it was from the pain or the shock. 

"--ance? Lance!"

Shiro pulled him by the elbow out of his trance and stepped up to take his place in front of a murmuring and unsettled crowd, already apologizing. 

He was caught by Hunk, who said his name again, looking concerned. "Lance, are you okay?" 

Lance couldn’t answer, could only catch his breath, though he wasn't sure how he had lost it. 

"I gotta get out of here," he said, then pushed past Hunk and makes a break for the hallway outside the gym. He could feel eyes following his exit, and for once, he didn’t appreciate it. 

"Hunk..." Shiro started, covering the microphone with his hand. Hunk nodded, and followed Lance.

Shiro turned back to the audience and tried to make everyone forget that something had gone wrong. For a room full of high school students it was more or less impossible, but with a face like Shiro's, he got pretty darn close. 

"Hi, everybody. My name is Takashi Shirogane, and I'll be directing  _ Space Dash 2 _ . Thank you for hosting us." Shiro bowed slightly, and then smiled. A majority of the girls, and a good number of the boys, paid better attention after that.

\--

\--

"I'm Lance Osuna, and I play Crow."

"What a charmer," Pidge muttered. The girls behind them practically screamed, and Pidge covered their ears.

This was usually the part where Keith would make another sarcastic remark, and then they would both laugh about it, but when Pidge turned to look at him he was staring, open mouthed, at the boy standing down on makeshift stage in the middle of the basketball court, posing for their cameras.

"Oh, God, Keith. Don't tell me you're not immune to this. Your taste is erratic at best--"

But then Pidge's eyes trailed down to where Keith's fingers were gripping at the sleeve covering the skin of his upper arm, and their jaw dropped. 

"No. No, no fucking way, Keith. It's  _ him? _ "

Keith was nearly shaking.  _ It's him. It's him. _ "He was in the preview," he managed to say. "At the theater."

He watched as the boy at the podium froze abruptly. He stood there silently for so long that the other students started to whisper, wondering "What's going on? What's happening? Is he acting?"

Keith's heart beat heavily in his chest, and then nearly stopped when the boy reached up and grasped tightly at his left arm, right where Keith's Mark was on his own body. He could only breathe properly again when the boy rushed out suddenly, running past his co-star and almost plowing down their principal. Another man started addressing them, taller with hair that was white, though he looked very young. The crowd started to calm, but there were sirens going off in Keith’s head.

"...Keith? What are you going to do?"

He blinked and looked at Pidge. "What do you mean?"

"I  _ mean _ , that's Lance  _ freaking _ Osuna. He was in the  _ Seven Kings _ reboot, and the first two seasons of the live action  _ Young Justice  _ series, and in like four other romantic comedies that I don't really care about but like everybody else has seen! And he's in  _ Space Dash! Space! Dash! _ "

"Wow, Pidge," Keith muttered, "Good to know you can read an IMDb page."

Keith's arm had cooled back down, but he held onto it as if it was going to fly off. “I have to get out of here.”

"What?"

Still struggling to keep air down, he got up from his seat and started moving down the bleachers. He hoped the commotion would keep anyone from noticing. "I'm gonna go home. See you later."

"You're--Keith! Keith, not again!"

\--

\--

"It's... just a bunch of dots."

The two of them were on set a little after their appearance at the high school, lounging somewhere shady while the crew set up some equipment for a chase scene. 

"It's not just about the dots, Hunk, it's about what the dots  _ represent _ ."

"And what do they represent?"

"I... don't really know."

He still couldn’t stop staring at it, totally at a loss as to what it could be. The dots appeared on his skin in two clusters--three on the left and six on the right, a few inches apart.

"See this one's, like, a triangle, and this part is like..." Hunk drew a squiggle with his finger in the air. 

"Maybe my Counter has freckles," Lance suggested, and Hunk  _ hm _ ed, considering it. 

"It's The Lion," a voice said from behind them, and they both jolted in their seats, turned, and looked up to see Shiro, peering down at them from behind, his arms folded across his chest.

"That? That's a lion?" Hunk looked at Lance, and then back at Shiro. "Are we seeing the same thing?"

"Not  _ a  _ lion,  _ The _ Lion. It's a constellation. Leo."

Lance pulled his sleeve back down over his mark and gave Shiro a shy smile. "Um, Shiro... Sorry about earlier, at the school. I don't know why I freaked out like that..."

"It's okay, we handled it, and I was more concerned about you than anything else. Besides," Shiro smiled back down at Lance, "any kind of publicity mess you get yourself into you're going to have to deal with on your own. Right, Hunk?"

"That's right!" 

Lance scowled. It had been  _ one time _ , one singular screw-up at a party in Buenos Aires that the publicity manager of the first  _ Space Dash _ had worked very hard to make sure everyone forgot. Lance also wanted to forget, but the returning production team never let him live it down. He was sure a couple of the lighting guys still had videos. 

Lance muttered, "It's not going to be like that, you guys." He put his chin in his hand and his foot up on his knee and pouted. "This place is way more boring than Buenos Aires."

"Aw, Lance, that's not true," Shiro said. "Sure, it doesn't have any night clubs or beaches but if you just look at it, really look at it..." He leaned forward against the back of their seats and looked out into the open desert, sweeping his hand over Lance's shoulder and out across the view. The sand went about as far as they can see, but if they tried they could make out silhouettes of the mountains miles away, a little hazy in the heat. 

"It feels like an adventure just waiting to happen, right?"

Hunk and Lance squinted, following Shiro's gaze; he was always kind of a romantic, but that was part of his job, and part of theirs was to play along.

"Sure, Shiro. If you say so." 

Shiro laughed and messed up Lance's hair.

"Anyway, it looks like you've already got some trouble waiting for you." Shiro gestured to Lance's Mark. Then he suddenly tilted them out of their chairs. "But first, we've got a scene to shoot. So could the two of you please get up so we can practice blocking?"

\--

"Lance, I  _ really _ think we should be getting back soon."

Hunk was crouched next to him, squished between a tall, grassy bush and the wall of the building. They were off set while the crew was shooting another scene, and back at the high school, sneaking around the campus and spying through windows to try and find Lance's Counterpart. 

"Come on, Hunk, they have to be here, I  _ felt _ it. And you heard Shiro. He literally told us to go have an adventure."

Lance peeked his eyes over the window sill of the classroom they're looking at and looked closely at each row of students. Some were taking notes, others were just staring up at board at the front of the room, and a few were sleeping. His Mark stayed cold.

"Can we at least take a break? It's, like, 90 degrees out."

"No, Hunk, if they start changing classes then we'll have to start all over again." Lance got on his hands and knees and started crawling over to the window to the next room. "Did we check this one?" 

"Yes, Lance. Twice." Hunk had figured out the layout of the school pretty quickly, but now that they had gone through it for almost an hour he’d gotten it pretty much memorized. 

Lance looked through the window anyway.

Okay, so if he had to admit it, he was a little scared. If he was being completely honest, he's downright terrified. He had never put much thought before into what he would do once he found his Counter; though he was excited by the idea of an awaiting destiny, the more he considered it the more he found himself wondering if he was ready. His parents had found each other when they were a good number of years older than he was, and he had expected it to be like that for him, too. And as much as Lance tried to enjoy the golden years of his youth and all that, he already had his career to think about. What would the producers do when they found out about this? Would they make him hide it? Would they exploit it? Lance wasn’t sure what was worse.

It all made his head spin.

"They're not here," Lance said, defeated, coming down from the window and sinking onto the gravel. "I thought for sure they would be here."

"Awesome. Let's head back now, then." 

But then Lance drew his knees up to his chest and looked at the ground. Hunk's smile faded. "I'm sorry, Lance. I know you were excited, but it's not like they're going anywhere. You'll find them." He patted Lance’s knee comfortingly.

Lance looked up at him. "Thanks, buddy, but... it's not that I'm worried I'm not going to find them, I'm just..." He turned away. Hunk raised an eyebrow, but didn’t press. 

When they left the school and turned the corner, Hunk started towards to the set, while Lance started towards the other end town. 

"Lance? What are you doing?"

"Do you think you could cover for me for a little while? I'll come back, I just... need to think for a bit."

Lance felt kind of bad, because Hunk was making that face that said he  _ really _ shouldn't, but he will, because he was Hunk, and he was Lance.

"Don't take too long, okay?"

\--

Lance walked in no particular direction.

How did one accept a stranger--especially one like Lance--into the rest of their lives? If they were a fan, or even if they weren't, there already had to be some kind of expectations of him in their mind. Would they be disappointed when they found out who he was? Not Lance, the movie star, but Lance, the person?

His brain kept going back and forth between questions like that, questions that made his stomach tighten, and  _ It's so fucking hot. _

His jacket was already off and tied around his waist, and it wasn’t like he didn’t have a high tolerance for heat, but this--this was a heat so dry that it was practically vacuuming the moisture out of his skin. 

Lance left his thoughts and looked around as he had just been transported into the middle of town. Most of the buildings he had passed were residences, and he noticed that nobody was out besides him. He guessed he was the only one dumb enough to go out for walk in this heat. 

There was a statue in the middle of the block that he saw when he turned another corner onto another street he had never been down. He approached it, and actually, there were two. They were lions, carved delicately from hard white stone. 

He went up to one and ran his hand over its smooth, pupil-less eyes and teeth--it was big enough that if it were real, Lance could probably stick his head in its mouth. They were very clean, polished to a glassy shine, free of the reddish brown dust that Lance imagined got on everything around here if left for too long. 

Lance looked at the storefront they were guarding--it was very old, and had a wooden door shut to keep out the heat. Through the square glass panels of the shop's tall windows, he could see shelves and a sign in large capital letters--RARE BOOKS. A smaller sign, far below it--OPEN. 

_ The Lion, _ he remembered, and he touched his Mark instinctively, looking back at the statues with their maws open mid-roar.

He pulled open the door and stepped inside.

\--

\--

Keith ended up at Alfor's. Coran emerged from the back room and looked surprised to see him sitting at his usual spot on an old stool behind the register with his legs crossed, flipping through a vintage magazine with a cover that said  _ Practical Mechanics _ .

"Keith? What are you doing here? Don't you have classes today?"

He jumped, surprised as he always was at Coran's sudden appearances. "I, um... Where's Allura?"

"She's meeting with an old friend."

He raised an eyebrow. "An old friend? I feel like she has a lot of those."

"Oh, yes, they come from all over the universe, you know--but that's just an exaggeration, of course! I meant country. They come from all over the country." Coran cleared his throat, and pulled a box up from beside a shelf, placed it on the counter in front of Keith, and started rummaging through it.

"So is it a school holiday? Earth has a lot of holidays, doesn't it? I can hardly keep track."

"Um..." Keith picked up his magazine and moved it high enough so that it covered his face. "...Something like that."

"Oh, but where's Pidge? You're usually off running about with them on your days off, aren't you?"

Keith sighed and put the magazine back down. It was better to get Coran on his side before Allura could get there and start making a big deal about it-- _ Think about your future, Keith! _

"Pidge is at school. I ditched." 

Coran looked up at him, eyebrows raised, but didn’t say anything. Even so, Keith got on the defensive.

"But, honestly, Coran, I just need a break sometimes! It's not like I'm not doing well in school, it just gets really stressful, so save the lecture, okay?" He crossed his arms and tried not to look too ashamed. 

But Coran only continued shuffling through the box. "I understand, Keith. In all the time I've known you, you've always worked quite hard. Allura and I are very proud of you for that!" Keith blushed, just a little, and is thankful Coran looked too occupied to notice. "But anyhoo," he went on, "It's always good to take the time to rest. Ah, here it is--" Coran finally pulled what he had been looking for out of the box and handed it to Keith. It was another issue of the magazine he was reading, this time with an image of a shuttle on the cover, hurtling towards the moon. "I think you'll like this one, too."

Keith took it and smiled. "Thanks, Coran."

Coran put the box back down and started moving towards the end of the store. "I'll be in the back if you need me!" 

Just as Coran disappeared behind the shelves, Keith heard the tinkling of the bell on the door, which creaked as it opened.

The first thing he heard was, "Holy shit, air conditioning."

The customer lingered at the front display, not having seen him yet. Keith's eyes widened when he realized who it was, and he wondered if he ran fast enough--

But it was too late.

Their eyes met, and a chill that Keith had never felt before crept down his left arm. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AND THEY're finally in the same scene
> 
> Hey everybody! Here's a longer update for ya. First, thank you a lot a lot a lot for your feedback so far--on Keith and Pidge's relationship, I placed them together sort of without thinking about it but then I realized that they would probably be really good at dealing with each other, and I love it
> 
> Also can you tell I love when my boys get acknowledgement and affection even if it's not from each other. Bc I do. I really do
> 
> \+ Can you recognize the connection between Lance and Hunk and their Space Dash characters? idk I tried lol also dc needs to bring back young justice to television, and no, I'm not letting the "Allura and Coran are aliens in every universe" joke die
> 
> anyway, again, please keep letting me know what you think either here or on [tumblr](http://staarlance.tumblr.com)\--thank you if you've checked out my blog already but please talk to me i'd love to hear your thoughts and ideas on this fic or klance or voltron or anything else. also like i said, i'm lowkey (HIGHKEY) looking for a beta reader(s)--hmu!


	3. Meet Cute

The feeling reminded him of rippling, or cracking. No, the cold moved even slower than that, like tiny streams of water dripping down his skin, or crawling just below it, all the way down to his fingertips. Keith flexed his hand, trying to stay calm.

The boy approached him slowly-- _ Lance Osuna, from the  _ Seven Kings _ reboot.  _ Keith couldn’t help but hear Pidge in his head, rattling off his filmography. He was holding onto his arm, probably experiencing the same sensation, but he wasn’t saying anything.

Keith was speechless as well. No one had ever told him what he was supposed to do in this situation. It felt a lot more unnatural than it was supposed to be. What was he supposed to say?  _ Hello, I'm Keith. Ready to spend the rest of our lives together? _

The words that fell out of his mouth were: "C-can I help you?" 

Lance looked taken aback by the question. "Uh,  _ yeah _ . I think you can." 

Keith bristled so visibly at his tone that Lance swallowed, nervously, and said more gently, "I think this, um, lead me here. To you. Oh, um--I'm Lance."

He held out his hand to shake. Keith could already see his Mark peeking out from under the fabric of his shirt. 

"I know who you are," he said, more coldly than he had intended. He cleared his throat and took Lance’s hand for just a moment, as if it would burn if he held it for any longer.

"Keith," Lance repeated, like he was testing the way it felt in his mouth. The sound of it made heat crawl up Keith's neck.

Then Lance pulled his sleeve up all the way and exposed his Mark. Keith couldn’t help but stare. It was, after all, who he was. A symbol of his existence, contained within five square inches of warm, brown skin. His fingers stretched; they were itching to touch it, but he restrained himself.

"Oh, it changed." Lance tilted his head, peering down at it his arm, and looked surprised to see white dots now connected by red lines so thin they were barely there.

"It's Leo," Keith murmured.

"Yeah, well, it's easy to see that  _ now _ ," Lance said defensively. He put his arm back down, and Keith looked up at him as if a spell had been broken. They stared at each other in silence for a good, awkward minute before Lance cleared his throat and said, "Well?"

"What?"

"Show me yours." Then he winked, and Keith scowled. 

It felt different revealing it now than it had felt showing it to Pidge. The store was quiet, save for the soft humming of the A/C; he couldn’t even hear Coran scuttling around in the back room. It all felt very still, as if the whole universe was waiting to see the Mark it had drawn onto him. 

It hadn't been a fish hook, he realized when he finally stretched out his hand, palm up, and pulled back his sleeve. Connected to the curved line, now, was a half circle, separated into three sections. Even its color had gotten more vivid, the blue contrasting boldly with his complexion. 

"It's..." Lance took in a deep breath, and finished anticlimactically. "An umbrella. Huh."

"You mean you don't know what it means?"

Lance made a face."It's a freakin' umbrella. I mean, I  _ own _ an umbrella."

"Wow. Here I am, matched up with the owner of the only umbrella in existence."

"Maybe it means I  _ make it rain _ ." Lance tossed imaginary dollar bills at Keith with  _ fwips _ of his fingers.

"Maybe it means you cry too much."

Lance glared at him. "All right, wise guy, you've got some rude explanation for this, too?" He gestured to his own arm.

Keith wasn’t really sure, either, as to why Lance's Mark was what it was. He said so, and Lance asked, "So does that mean you're not a Leo?"

"I'm an Aries," Keith said flatly. 

Lance scoffed. "Figures."

The bell on the door chimed again. They both straightened, only just noticing how far they had been leaning into their--conversation? Argument? Keith wasn’t really sure. What he  _ was _ , actually, was irritated.

"Hello, Keith! I wasn't expecting you back here yet. Did school let out early?" 

Keith's annoyance grew sharper when he saw the dumbfounded look on Lance's face as Allura walked in. His eyes rolled back into his brain when Lance's mouth fell open at the sight of her letting her hair down from its tight bun, fluffing the thick waves of silver and tossing them over her shoulders. 

She noticed Lance and greeted him. "Oh, good afternoon! Welcome to Alfor's Rare Books. I hope you've been receiving all the assistance you need."

"He's not--"

"No, unfortunately, I haven't," Lance answered smoothly, cutting Keith off. "But I think you could really help me out." He leaned on the counter and turned his back completely on Keith, giving her a sparkling smile he reserved for photo shoots and beautiful women. "I'm Lance, and  _ you _ must be a godde--OOF!"

Keith had picked up the heaviest volume he could find behind the counter--a tome that had to be a thousand pages thick, titled  _ Rocks: A Phenomenon _ \--and shoved hard it into Lance's chest, pushing the air out of his lungs and filling them instead with dust unique to books that haven't been opened in decades.

"What--the  _ fuck _ \--" Lance coughed, "are you  _ doing? _ "

Keith's words came out in a loud, unnatural staccato. "What's that, sir? That wasn't the right rock book? Don't worry, Allura! I'll help him find it!" 

Allura looked very confused as Keith snatched the book out of Lance's hands, dropped it on the counter, and dragged him to their weirdly extensive Geology section. 

So his Counterpart was exactly who he had expected.  _ Fantastic _ , Keith thinks.

"What was that about?"

"I think you're forgetting the whole point of having these things," Keith said, squeezing Lance's arm, feeling the warmth of his Mark beneath his sleeve, and ignoring the way his own hand reacted to the contact.

Lance looked guilty for just a moment, before he shot back, "Yeah, maybe I'll remember that when  _ you _ do _. _ " He ripped his arm away from Keith's grip, and Keith's body urged him to reach out and take it back, which only makes him angrier. 

"Sorry, I guess I should be more grateful, right? I just lucked out, didn't I, ending up with a big fucking star like you? Is that what you wanted to hear?"

Lance's eyes widened. Then he pushed Keith away, knocking him into a bookshelf that shook dangerously from the impact. "I'm leaving," he said, and he did, the bell on the door ringing behind him, leaving Keith to seethe on his own.

\--

\--

“Cut! Let’s take five.”

Shiro pulled Lance aside after a seventh failed take.

"What's going on with you, Lance? You're forgetting blocking, your lines, you're not even listening to my directions. This isn't like you."

Lance stared at his heel, digging it into the ground. "I know. I'm sorry."

Shiro frowned and then tilted his head to try to make some eye contact. "Lance? You didn't answer my question. What's going on?"

"It's nothing!" Lance looked back up and put on his  _ I screwed up, but everything’s gonna be just fine  _ smile. "My bad, Shiro. I know I keep wasting everyone's time, but... you can call everybody back. I can finish the scene. It won't happen again, promise.”

And Shiro was  _ very _ over it. "Lance, stop. The cameras are off. I know when something's wrong with you, so, as a friend, just tell me. What's going on?"

He placed a hand on Lance's shoulder and looked him straight in the eyes, which they both knew was a surefire way to get Lance to admit anything. 

"...I met my Counterpart yesterday."

Shiro's expression softened immediately. "You did? Lance, that's great! How did it go?"

He registered Lance's silence. "Not too hot, huh?"

Lance sighed, exasperated. "He was just... He was so..." He ran his hands through his hair, trailing off.

"So...?"

"So  _ not cute!  _ He was rude and  _ violent _ and pushy and his  _ hair _ , just...  _ ugh! _ "

Shiro frowned, sympathetic. "I'm sorry, Lance, but... He was just like that, out of the blue?"

Lance blinked up at him, not really sure what to say until Shiro interpreted his silence again. "... Lance, what did you do?"

He told Shiro what had happened, starting from the lion statues out on the sidewalk, then what had happened with the woman who had walked into the store ("And she was like,  _ totally _ out of this world--um, not that that matters, but anyway--"), then finally how he had pushed Keith and ran out. 

"Don't  _ look _ at me like that, Shiro."

"Come on, Lance. The flirting? I'm disappointed in you."

Lance was mortified. "You don't understand, okay, it's not like I was being serious about it, I was  _ completely  _ joking, and it's not like he  _ cared _ , I don't even think…”

“Think what?”

"I just… I know, Shiro, I  _ get _ that this is supposed to be a beautiful thing and all, but you weren't there. I honestly thought he hated me. I still he think he does.” Lance’s eyes lowered. “Even before I said anything, I think he was already hating me."

"Lance, he doesn't hate you. Or, well..." He scratched his temple, second guessing. "Maybe he does."

"Real confidence booster there, Shiro."

"But if that's true, then he's wrong to think that. Everyone--me, Hunk, your family, all the people working on this set--we know who you are, and we love you for it." Then he sighed, "But neither of you had the best first impression of each other, and I bet he's just as confused and scared of this as you are, Lance. He's lucky to have you, but you need to prove it."

“I’m not  _ scared _ !”

Shiro raised a brow.

"...Okay, I am. But how am I supposed to prove it?"

"I'm not sure, Lance. You're a part of him, and he’s a part of you--you’ll find a way to make him understand. Remember what I told you: treat him, and this," Shiro pats Lance's mark over his sleeve, "With respect."

Lance grimaced. "All right, but you're saying that like it's easy."

Shiro laughed. "Sorry, but it really won't be. Just try, though, Lance. Okay? That's the only push I'm going to give you, but I want to think it's the only one you're going to need. Just try."

The crew was gathered a few yards away, talking and moving set pieces around, but mostly just waiting for Lance and Shiro to return, ready to work.

"...Okay, Shiro. I'll try."

\--

\--

Allura was holding a note in her hand when he entered the store a few days later.

“Hello, Keith,” she greeted, in a voice that’s suspiciously sing-songy.

Keith braced himself. “Hi, Allura. Uh, what’s up?”

She grinned. “Well, a boy came into the shop earlier looking for you. I told him you were out, and that he was welcome to wait, but he couldn't stay, so I let him leave you a message."

There were those sirens, again. Keith snatched the note from her hand. The letters were thin and long, a cramped mix between cursive and print.

_ Sorry about the other day. Can we talk? _

_ Lance _

There was a phone number under the name. His mind reeling, Keith closed his hand over the note, crushing it before stuffing it into his pocket.

“Thanks, I’ll get back to him later.” Then he turned and tried to escape to the back room, but Allura reached out and grabbed him by the back of his shirt.

“Explain yourself,” Allura said. It was in these moments that Keith wondered if she was some kind of imperial general in a past life. 

“E-explain what?”

“It was the same boy from the other day. Who was he? Do you have  _ other friends _ ?”

He wasn’t sure what was more embarrassing--that she was about to find out about Lance, or how surprised she sounded at the thought of him having other friends.

“What’s all the hubbub?” Coran popped into the room once again, carrying a tea tray. Keith groaned.

He considered lying, saying he was a friend, no, an acquaintance from school. But lying to Allura, as he had discovered early on, was a terrible, terrible idea. And even if it wasn’t--he couldn’t, not the way they were looking at him.

He took his arm out of his sleeve and held it out for them to see.

Allura gasped, taking her hands from Keith’s shirt and putting them over her mouth with a loud  _ smack _ .

"Keith! You’re  _ Marked _ ?”

“It’s not a big deal--”

“ _ Not a big deal?  _ This is a gigantic deal, a titanic deal! Oh, that’s fantastic!" She took his hands in hers before he could react. There were stars in her eyes. He started feeling queasy when he felt someone clap a hand on his shoulder--Coran, who gave him his brightest “Congratulations, my boy!”

Allura looked like a kid on Christmas Day. She held his arm delicately, like an antique vase, careful not to touch the lines. “Oh, it’s so cute,” she cooed.

“Um… yeah, I guess…”

“This is amazing! You have to call him, today, right now! I’ll get you a phone--Coran, do we have a phone? That’s what they use here, right? Telephones?”

“Allura, stop--he isn’t--we aren’t--”

“O, beautiful universe!” She sang, “Eons in the making, existence colliding and flowing since long before either of you were born to bring you both to this very moment!” Her voice broke, and she put her face in her hands. 

“Oh my g--Allura, are you crying? Please stop.” Keith even noticed Coran dabbing at his eyes with a handkerchief as he poured cups of tea. “It’s breathtaking,” he said, and blew his nose. 

This hadn’t been at all how he had expected this to go. 

“I’m sorry,” she said, dabbing her tears gracefully from her face, “I’m just so proud of you, Keith.”

Keith had been shorter than Allura when they first met. Over the years he had grown tall enough to look her in the eye, and now he was even a bit taller. But there were still moments where her presence suddenly made him feel fourteen again. This was one of those times.

“I’m… I’m not getting  _ married _ , Allura.”

“Oh, marriage--what an earthly concept. No, this--this is one of the hardest challenges you’ll ever face, and the greatest adventure on which you’ll ever embark.”

_ Challenge is right _ , Keith thought, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud.

“Everything is going to change. But you’ll be so much better for it.”

She took a deep breath and put on a wide smile. Keith wished he could disintegrate on the spot. 

“But I’m sorry--you were saying something?” 

Keith’s brain was frozen, or melted, or maybe just gone altogether. What was he going to say, again?  _ Hey Allura, I was actually thinking about skipping town for the next decade or so, would you mind forwarding my mail? _

“I w-was just… um, I’ll call him.” He gave her a weak smile, and let her throw her arms around him for a tight hug. Behind her shoulders he could see Coran waiting with steaming cups of congratulatory tea. 

He reached into his pocket and felt the edges of Lance’s note. He would regret this, he thought, but for the moment it was the right choice.

“Of course you will! You could even ask him to help out at the shop--it’s Reshelving Day!”

\--

“You’re a pussy.”

Keith snatched a fry from Pidge’s hand and stuffed it into his mouth. They were eating at Shay’s, the diner on Third, which could usually make him feel better about anything but today the food had no taste.

“Hey!”

“I have literally never seen Allura get that emotional about  _ anything _ . Remember how she started sobbing when we showed her  _ Arrival  _ and she kept replaying it in the back room for a week until the DVD broke? This was worse than that.”

Pidge sighed. “I never got that DVD back.”

“Pidge, this is serious.”

“So what now? It’s not my fault you just left out the part where you hate him. Good call, by the way, probably would’ve broken her heart.” 

“I--I don’t  _ hate  _ him, I just--”

“Oh, so he just hates  _ you _ .”

Keith went wild-eyed. “I just don’t understand why this had to happen to me, of all people! I didn’t ask for this, this is--it’s just ridiculous, it’s crazy, I-I’m in high school for the love of--”

“You’re spiraling, Keith.”

Keith took a deep breath, and spun the fry he’d been holding around in his ketchup, having given up on eating it. He’d lost his appetite.

“I just don’t know how I’m supposed to be together forever with some cocky Hollywood douchebag I just met.”

“You just met him and you already know he’s a cocky Hollywood douchebag?”

“Did I not tell you about our first impressions?”

“Oh, come on. Scully and Mulder didn’t like each other when they first met.”

Keith opened his mouth, then closed it, his fists clenching. “My life isn’t a sci-fi drama on  _ Fox _ .”

“True, but wouldn’t that be cool?”

“No--I mean, yes, it would, definitely, but that’s irrelevant. Look, it’s obvious we’re just… from different worlds. I don’t belong in his, and he doesn’t belong in mine.” 

He felt a pang in his chest as he said it, and Pidge looked at him with fresh eyes, the clues to the riddle clicking into place.

“Ohhh, I get it--you don’t think you’re _ cool enough _ for him.”

“I’m going to fight you, I swear to God. Let’s go, right now.”

“I’ll just lay it out on the table for you, because if I don’t I feel like you’re just going to keep denying it. You’re scared because you’re a small town kid who’s never been west of Phoenix and he has one and a half million followers on Twitter and did a photoshoot for GQ.” 

“What, do you have a Google Alert on him or something?”

“You think I’m not gonna do my research on the love of your life?”

“He’s not the love of my life!”

“Not yet, you mean,” Pidge corrected, reaching over and taking a long slurp from Keith’s drink. “But I think you’re selling yourself short. You really think he’d be your Counter if you were from ‘different worlds’?” They used air quotes. Keith hated when Pidge used air quotes. 

“Now you’re starting to sound like Allura,” Keith muttered, but he was losing the fight. Against Pidge, and against the universe. 

“I mean, when was the last time Allura was wrong about anything?”

Keith blinked. He had no answer.

“Exactly. You should talk to him again. I mean,  _ I  _ figured out you’re not an asshole. You know, eventually.”

“Thanks, buddy.”

“Anytime. Can I have the rest of this?”

Keith shrugged, and Pidge finished his milkshake.

\--

Later that day, Keith takes Lance’s note from his pocket and dials the number scrawled at the bottom.

“Hey. It’s me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I notice that Pidge makes a lot of references lmao because I’m a fucking millennial and I feel like Pidge is very in tune with The Culture 
> 
> thank you for reading!


End file.
